I’ve been reading a bunch of Facebook-hating stuff lately. I’ve had signing up for FB on my to-do list for some time, and it’s nice to have an excuse to wait, even though I feel like there are some good things I’ve been missing out on. On the other hand, privacy is nice, too, and on the internet, once you lose it, you can’t get it back.

I’m thisclose to deleting my Facebook account, too.
The trouble is, back when I had control of the information I posted there, it served a really good function. I want a space to reconnect with distant friends and relatives.
I’m just not willing to sell my biography, interests, and connections to fund the site.
This is all about funding, I suppose. Facebook can’t get paying advertisers without mining the data. But they can’t really offer a fee-based private site now, not when they used to be private for free.

Sara and I skimmed the comment thread on Megan McArdle’s excellent academic workforce post yesterday and started coming up with a list of tournament systems to steer young people away from.
The list so far:JournalismPro sportsFine art and classical musicGame developmentAcademia (excepting certain fields)Other performing arts (including rock music)Fashion
Any others?

I don’t think we want to steer young people away from tournament systems. For those not well connected and not overly systematic in their thinking, it is one of the few ways to get ahead. I just think that you should be able to multiple the odds of “winning” by the value of the “prize” and be able to hit something like $15,000* per year it took to get a ticket.
*Not a firm number.

MH, do you think that any of the fields I listed pass your formula? In particular, game development (as detailed by one of Megan’s commenters) doesn’t seem to require a ticket more expensive than the opportunity costs. However, those opportunity costs may be massive for someone who could be working at a professional level at a software job.

MH, do you think that any of the fields I listed pass your formula?
I’m sure some of them do, for some people. For example, I just now learned that DEVO is still touring. Even a relatively low $10 million dollar payout could justify spending a few years for a 2 or 3 percent chance of success. (I’m not actually going to do the math properly by using a discount rate.)